We are committed to ensuring that 100% of workers have access to workplaces that treat them with respect, with means to raise issues safely.
Our Respect and Dignity training programme is our commitment to go beyond basic supplier compliance. It seeks to achieve equal voices and equal treatment, and enhanced worker wellbeing.
The programme aligns with the UN Women’s Empowerment Principles and involves training and awareness-raising with management, supervisors and workers in five key areas: fair and transparent recruitment, equality in pay and performance, maternity rights, health and safety measures which work for everyone, and effective grievance mechanisms.
Our vision is for all workers, wherever they are, to have access to workplaces that treat them with respect, dignity and to have equal opportunities to raise their voices through effective worker committees and strong grievance mechanisms.
When a factory is onboarded onto the programme, we conduct a baselining exercise which reviews policies, systems, data, and worker awareness (established through extensive worker interviews).
For example, this has revealed that inequality in pay for the same job role is not prevalent, but there have been instances of women moving down a seniority level after returning from maternity leave.
Honing in on the prevalence gender-based issues in an evidence-based way enables us to tailor the programme to the specific needs of the factory and strengthen systems to ensure that these issues do not reoccur.
So far, we have reached over 15,876 workers, representing 27% of the people in our Tier 1 supply chain. By the close of FY24, we will have reached 35% of the workers in our supply chain."
We have focused on establishing the programme sustainably in India initially, reaching 65% of workers in this territory and equating to 93% of our India product volume.
We are now piloting Respect and Dignity in Turkey before we expand to other territories. We are passionate about embedding the programme in the best way for each individual factory and its workers.
Case Study
Elegant Overseas & Richa Global
Elegant Overseas joined Superdry’s Respect and Dignity programme in October 2020.
Based in Gurgaon, India, Elegant produces Superdry’s organic t-shirts and polos, employing over 1,400 workers, 12% of whom are women, and 88% men. Through Respect and Dignity, Elegant aims to raise and sustain awareness of gender equality throughout the factory – with hopes of wider impacts within homes and communities.
To do this, with the support of local expert trainers, they formed worker champion groups, training 12 people throughout the factory on gender-related issues, problem-solving and communication. This group was equipped to take the gender equality agenda forward and run education and awareness sessions for their peers.
A major factor in strengthening the position of workers is fair representation through effective worker committees. The worker champions also sit on each of the factory’s various worker committees to ensure that someone with enhanced knowledge of gender-related issues always has a seat at the table and maintain the champions’ visibility, to enable workers to reach out to them.
Since establishing the worker champions, Elegant has invested in monthly capacity-building sessions, conducted by an independent expert, for their sexual harassment prevention committee.
This ongoing commitment has created an environment where gender equality work is owned by workers and
management (rather than being driven externally, by a brand or an NGO) and has resulted in a shift in knowledge and confidence levels in speaking about gender throughout the factory.
Watch the below video to hear from the workers
at Richa Global, India.“The awareness among the workers has been outstanding. The workers used to be hesitant to approach HR, that has vanished. They are aware of the right channels to raise grievances.” - Jyoti, Labour Welfare Officer
